


The Gilded Lamb

by Tvieandli



Category: Kuroshitsuji | Black Butler
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-04-03
Updated: 2014-04-24
Packaged: 2018-01-18 02:22:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 13,621
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1411393
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tvieandli/pseuds/Tvieandli
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was dark inside the room. Dark, and the air was still but it did not smell bad so much as it smelled strange. She lingered at the door breath sucked in to her stomach and too afraid to come spilling back out past the blade at her throat.</p><p>     "It's me," she said, watching the line of the saber's cold talon quiver and then lower toward the ground. </p><p>     "Well you should fucking knock," he replied.</p><p>Anne asks Lau to help her recover some of her sister's things that have been stolen and they are led on a hunt that spans from the docks on the Thames out to Sussex where the thief is hiding his goods. Slight AU non canon compliant.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> There may be a bit of name confusion reading this in order to clear that up: Anne is calling Lau Loo. She is the only person to do this as everyone else calls him Lau. When Lau pronounces his and Ran-Mao's names they are spelled using proper pinyin to show that their names are pronounced differently by native English speakers.

It was dark inside the room. Dark, and the air was still but it did not smell bad so much as it smelled strange. She lingered at the door breath sucked in to her stomach and too afraid to come spilling back out past the blade at her throat.

"It's me, Loo," she said, watching the line of the saber's cold talon quiver and then lower toward the ground. 

"Well you should fucking knock," he replied. He turned on his heel into the dark room, and disappeared behind a silk screen. She heard something shift in the space beyond but didn't know what it was. She assumed it was one of his girls, features as ethnic as his, sloping and exaggerated around the cheekbones and soft in the jaw. Loo was always surrounded by the most beautiful girls. 

"What's the matter? Why are you here?" he asked from his obscured position. There was a sound like fabric on fabric and she relized he was dressing himself better. 

Likely, she had scared him out of bed. Loo had been a pirate for years and many times she was sure pirates got scared out of beds by law enforcement or other pirates or just people looking to make some money. She felt a bit bad making him think that she'd been an intruder out for his life but there hadn't really been anything for it.

"I was in need," she said.

"Need?" he asked. He was back from around the screen in no time wearing nothing but a pair of cotton spun pants. She stared at the scars on his arms and chest, trying to make out their shapes in the dark for but a moment before they frightened her and she had to avert her eyes for fear her vivid imagination would run away with her. 

"Of your expertise, yes," she told him.

He picked a tinder box off of some table top, and lit a lamp, flooding the intricate maze of furniture they stood in with light. Exotic plants grew up out of pots in corners beautifully taken care of by hands that knew their practice, weapons hung on the walls like references to Greek literature as they dangled over the heads of opium addled bedlamites and gentry alike. 

He motioned towards a beautiful couch along the wall and sat on it so he faced her entirely instead of staring still at the screen he had slipped behind previously. She took the seat graciously, glad to be off her heeled and pointed boots as they had begun to dig into her feet. 

"I have quite a few areas or expertise," he said regally, his accent peeking in through years of diction practice so that it did not flavor his words entirely so much as season them. Before meeting Loo, she hadn't realized that non-European foreigners could learn to speak English with such adeptness and care. Loo, despite many political cartoons to the contrary, was smarter than almost every English gentleman she had ever met. Getting to know him and learning of his life had made her realize that it was all a bit more complex than riding on the success of one's parentage. In a small way, his outright defiance of social expectations for a Chinese person in England had been what inspired her to really say no one could stop her from being a doctor if she wanted to. 

"I'm aware you do," she said. "But I certainly don't need to call on all of them. In fact, I think I'll only call on one area tonight as the hour is late and you seem to be already retired."

"You act like I'm made out of the same delicate material as your equals and betters but I'll have you know that my status below you elevates me beyond you," he returned. 

She caught him with an odd look. "Dose your girl back there speak any English?" she asked. 

Loo seemed to contemplate that for a moment. "My little sister has been in England as long as I have," he said.

"Yes but has she learned the language yet? I'm sure that if I spent many years in China I still would not be smart enough to learn such a different language as yours."

"Then perhaps the intelligence gap is the opposite of what we have been lead to believe," he said.

"So she speaks English?"

"She does not like to speak because she doesn't want you English boars to mock her voice but she understands well what's being said. I'm surprised you even felt the need to ask. Most of your people would just assume that no pretty little China doll had the intellect to decipher the mysteries they spoke. " His sarcasm was potent.

"If you could learn and you're a man then certainly a woman could. We all know which gender is superior and if it were men then Kings would take us as far as Queens but they never have," she declared.

He laughed, bare chest heaving with the uneven intake of his chest. She noticed that one of his nipples had been cut through and scarred over and mourned her own breasts at the thought of receiving the same. 

"What sort of confidential information is this that you are so worried as to systematically insult every father you've ever had?" he asked when he'd sobered.

"I am sorry to trouble you too much, Loo but it seems that some of my sister's valuables have been stolen from her and she is desperate to get them back."

"You're so worried about some oriental girl hearing about stolen goods that you had to be sure she knew no English?" Loo asked.

"I don't wish to be spreading rumors to people who are associated strongly with thieves that a noble person's home was robbed because it might give them ideas. You have to admit, Loo, your reputation is not the finest thing to be proceeded by."

"Yes, but it is something, Anne and that's a hell of a lot more than most Chinamen can say."

"I suppose," she admitted. "But does this mean you'll help me or not?"

"My dear woman we haven't discussed payment. How can I agree to anything without first discussing the payment?"

"You'll have payment, Loo! Look at me, I'm a woman of status! I married a Baron in my twenties! I came from money as a babe! I can assure you whatever payment you like," she promised.

"Not whatever payment, Anne, even you have limits."

"Name a price then."

"Queen Victoria."

She smacked him square in the shoulder, the palm of her hand bouncing ineffectually off of his collar bone. A splotchy red mark began to rise then on his pale skin. There was an odd pause. 

The girl behind the screen said something in Cantonese, pulling Loo's attention. He laughed at whatever meaning her words hid behind their esoteric consonants and turned back to Anne. 

"My little sister says that if a woman is willing to hit me for suggesting she steal the Queen I have to accept her proposal," he explained.

"Well then I was right about her being smarter than you, wasn't I?" Anne retorted. The girl behind the screen laughed in such an open and honest manner that she sounded like a man rather than a lady or a girl at all.

"There's only one real question I have left," he explained. "Why not go to the Yard?"

"Have you ever tried going to the Yard with your problems, Loo?" 

"No," he said.

"Well then why would the Yard be good enough for me if they're not good enough for you?"

"A fair point," he said. "I keep forgetting that the nobles are the mafia here and that's why you don't have any room for organized crime." He waited a moment, clearly thinking.

"Alright," he said finally. "I'll do it, but this is only because we have such a good relationship already I'll have you understand. I don't just track down jewels whenever someone decides the Yard is inconvenient to toil with."

"Oh thank you so much, Loo. How I can repay you is a mystery until you name your price. I swear by my blood's name though, and the titles of my forefathers and all the money they ever had, that I will match your price if not exceed it."

"I look forward to the money then," he said. "I'll meet you tomorrow at your home, and we'll start looking for a trail then, but for now I'm in need of much more sleep and much more sex, so you'll have to get out unless you want to join."

Anne flustered, feeling her chest grow hot and tight. "I know I haven't got the best reputation as a lady but that doesn't mean I'm a common prostitute. You're not allowed to just proposition me willy-nilly," she said, feeling a bit of burning anger turn her cheeks red.

"You know where the door is, Anne," he said calmly, with a soft smile. She turned her nose up at him as she regained her feet and marched out the door. Before it closed she heard the girl giggle and shook out an odd shiver that ran down her spine.

She had been celibate since the accident that had robbed her of reason to have sex, and now the memory of being touched like that with the new information that nothing would ever come of it made her feel slightly ill. She shook her head and began her way down the narrow hallway, past all of the sweet smelling rooms where people lay to wait out their intoxication and to the front door.

Her footman helped her up into the carriage and shut the her in tight so that she was constrained to look out the little windows as London began to move outside. She didn't want to go home. Her home was vast and empty now that her husband had died and it left her lonely when she was in the empty spaces between it's walls.

He came calling the next morning dressed in a green dress with a woman hanging from his side like a little pink pearl. 

"Anne, this is my sister, Lán-Māo," he said with a sweeping motion. "She's shy about English people so she won't say hello but that's who she is," he explained further when Anne turned to address her. Anne introduced herself with a small curtsey anyway afraid of possibly offending the girl's sensibilities if she did not greet her properly.

"Would you two care for breakfast?" she asked, gesturing behind herself.

"I was actually hoping for breakfast," Loo said almost proudly. 

"Were you?"

"Yes. I'm quite hungry, you see?"

She scoffed at him but lead them to the dining room regardless. As she had expected them early that day she had had the staff make a slight show of the meal. It was true that Loo, regardless of the status of his birth, had been granted titles and made gentry in China, and that meant that he was someone who had to be at least slightly impressed no matter how close you were to him.

He chose to sit in the seat catty-corner and right of her so that they could speak quietly without the maids and tweenies hearing any potentially sensitive information that could come up. 

"So what is the nature of the theft?" he asked when his plate had been placed before him with salmon and a soft cooked egg. He slit the yolk open with his knife and used it as a dipping sauce as they spoke. She noticed his companion did the same.

"While my sister and her husband were sleeping, their home was infiltrated and a number of their valuables were taken."

"Does this look like a robbery in the sense that someone wants to make money or does it look like there was a specific object or set of objects in mind?" he asked.

"Definitely the latter," she said. "There were a number of items stolen from my sister's jewelry box, but not much more than that."

"Where does she keep the jewelry box?" he asked. 

"In her bedroom on her nightstand."

"How was she not woken by the intruder then?"

Anne pressed her lips firmly together, looked at the bite of salmon she'd twisted onto her fork and felt distinctly self conscious on her sister's behalf. "She was spending the night with her husband, I'm afraid," she said softly.

"Really? A lady spending a night with her husband? Isn't that a bit outgoing of her? I thought the man usually came to the lady's room."

"It isn't as if a women has never wanted a child, Loo, you'll know that," she warned.

"Does she not have one?"

"That is beside the point. My sister was with her husband the night of the robbery and the things were taken from her jewelry box which was on her nightstand in her bedroom where she wasn't. It's not that complicated."

"Do you have a description of the objects?"

"No," she said.

"No?" he asked.

"No."

"Well I can't just be expected to find something if I don't even know what it looks like," he said in defense.

"That's quite alright, you won't have to," she assured.

"Anne this is really quite round about isn't it, you are hiring me to find something. If I don't find it how on earth am I to earn the payment?"

"You misunderstand me. I am hiring you to track down the robbers and escort me so that I might find the missing items in question."

"Why?" he asked. "Why bother going to all this trouble? What's the point?"

"The items stolen were very valuable."

"What on earth could have been taken that you have to go after it yourself and if it's that important why isn't your sister off after it instead?"

"My sister is an asthmatic, she cannot take the physical activity. I on the other hand am a doctor. As a working woman I am much more fit to take the challenge."

"Why not her husband then?"

"Because Vincent is very busy. Trust me, Loo I was the only person this could come to."

"I'm not taking you to chase after robbers, Anne," he said then, stabbing a bite of fish rather viciously.

"This is because I'm a woman isn't it?" she asked.

"You're a woman? I'd quite forgotten," he said quickly. She gasped in over exaggerated offense but he barreled on past that. "You're being ridiculous, Anne, I'm not some superstitious European man, and I'm not some pretty Gentle person either. I have no illusions about the idea that women can take care of themselves. In fact, you would see that my own sister is someone I take with me on business quite often as she is a very competent fighter, and without her my job would be made much more difficult. I am saying I will not take you chasing after robbers because you are a noble woman and a doctor not a pirate or a cutpurse in any sense of the matter. You don't have the proper skills."

"That's why you're taking me and I'm not going alone isn't it? If you refuse even still you cannot stop me. I understand that a foreign dignitary is granted certain rights but I am a noble woman who has strong ties to the Earl of Phantomhive and you are not native here so I would suggest you do not try to detain me."

He sat back in his seat with a huff and glared into the air in front of him wordlessly. "Fine," he said finally after a long silence had passed in tense anticipation. "I'll take you, but you'll let us handle everything."

"Fine," she agreed.

"Then after breakfast I would expect you to take me to the house that I may inspect the method that was used to enter it," he told her, uncrossing his arms and resuming his meal.

She tried not to let the violent excitement her small victory filler her with show, but he saw it and this he made clear by sending her a few snide glances as they ate.

By the time they arrived at the Phantomhive manor it was around noon and the sun was beating down on them cruelly. The house itself looked beautiful but she was sweating and certain she did not as she huffed up to the front door and watched her footman introduce their presence. 

The family butler, an older Japanese man named Tanaka who had worked in the house longer than chickens had laid eggs, surveyed them quietly before becoming them in. He and Loo exchanged a strange look, one that gave Anne the feeling Loo was not exactly welcome by the old man. Likely because he could see the thin line of green ink that his cheongsam failed to hide as it reached up the column of his neck and knew him immediately as one of the household's less acceptable of guests. 

"I'm glad you're allowing us entrance even with the family away," she said to him when he took her coat.

"The family is away?" Loo asked. His face remained ever passive and inscrutable but she got the feeling that for once she was the one annoying him and not the other way around. 

"Yes, I told you, Vincent is very busy."

"And so your sister is with him?"

"They have a very loving marriage."

He caught her with another one of his sideways looks, telling her full well that he knew something wasn't right with this whole goose chase she seemed to be leading him on. She turned her nose up at him when Tanaka wasn't looking so that he understood she couldn't have cared ever, not once, even a bit, what he thought.

Tanaka was kind enough to lead them to the bedroom where a window had been damaged when the burglar had used a knife to pry open it's lock from the outside, and the jewelry box sat on the nightstand, clearly much more damaged than it had been prior to the incident, it's surface scratched likely by the same knife that had been used to ply the window so that its more complex locking mechanism could have been circumvented. 

Loo looked at the window and at the jewelry box but as most men would cared nothing for the overturned bassinet in the corner along the same wall as the entry point. 

"This person had to have been that experienced as a thief coming in the second story window like that but they seem almost amateur in some ways," Loo declared as his sister helped Anne right the cradle.

"Why do you think that, sir?" Tanaka asked him curiously.

"Well, clearly he has no lock picking ability or he wouldn't have been so insistent."

"Perhaps they simply didn't think they had the time, sir," the butler suggested. Loo only made a small humming sound and continued to turn the box over in his hands.

"That's a good point but if he were more experienced it shouldn't have been a problem. Unless this lock is made from some unknown super locking lock stuff that is," he added on. Tanaka seemed unimpressed with him. 

"I'm sure you know much more about it than I do, sir," Tanaka told him. She watched Loo's face curl around that insult near imperceptibly and shot a look at the girl across from her.

She was a small thing but the muscle in her arms was not entirely hidden or belied by the slight coverage her bolero-like jacket gave her. She looked more sturdy than an ox and fierce and keen like so many people who had starved seemed to look but she wasn't anything shy of gorgeous and her movements were balanced and graceful to a degree that it wasn't much of a surprise European men would fall over her like flies.

Anne shot her a look and it was returned as if to say that the girl understood deeply how delicate Loo's sensibilities could be if one caught a chink in his armor. The man seemed impervious to attack but women always knew better. that look held in it a boisterousness and personality that could never have been contained in words or speech and shouldn't have had to be. Anne appreciated it in the deep and meaningful way only a woman could appreciate another woman. 

"An idiot sometimes, isn't he" she asked as Loo set the jewelry box down on the table.

The girl opened her mouth as if to be bold enough to reply but Loo cut her off with a declaration to the room as a whole that they needed to return to London at once.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In this chapter the Undertaker says some racist things to both Lau and Ran-Mao. I assure you this is not so much because I think they should be treated this way as I am trying to accurately represent at least some of the issues they would face being Chinese in England in 1870-something. I apologize if it is poorly handled and ask that you correct me if it is problematic. I don't mean any of this to be harmful so much as honest.

The docks smelled like fish and rotting sea water but she didn't complain because it wasn't as if she had never been to them before. Loo and his little sister marched ahead of her briskly leaving her to keep pace with no one at all as they hurried along the crowded boardwalk. 

Foreign sailors rushed about them interested in nothing but finishing their work and getting off to some pub somewhere for something alcoholic to suck down their parched throats so that they could set fire to their own deserts. She pulled the hem of her skirt up nervously, afraid that someone might tread on it and turn the brilliant red color it was into something more dingy and dismal and fitted to the place. She was infinitely jealous of this girl's dress ending so high on her legs regardless of the scandal of it. 

Loo was speaking to her in quick Cantonese, voice pitched low but not low enough for Anne to miss snippets of his elongated vowels and complex diphthongs blown back to her on the breeze. It was not the first time that she had wished she had the ability to speak both languages as he did. Mostly due to her curiosity surrounding his female companion and what she would have to say if she cared to speak. 

He turned them in to a small warehouse front and entered without knocking as she would have expected him to. Inside, a large room was filled with sacks of spices from Asia that were still fresh enough to be a pungent force to be reckoned with. There were racks of silk as well, and she instantly recognized that the reason Loo cared nothing for knocking was that he owned the building they had just entered. This must have been part of his import company in some regard. She wondered how many illegal goods had exchanged hands here.

A number of Chinese workmen were busy inside, likely most of them illegally imported as well. Loo waved one man over and they exchanged brief stinted words that made it sounds as if they could not properly communicate with one another. The worker then left to see to something and Loo turned back to her with a mutter of "country shit" as if that explained it. She wondered if the man had some thick accent. He had sounded different.

He returned with another man behind him. This man was tall with black skin and a smile that could have eaten its way through any corset string. 

"Haven't seen you in this ware house in a while, Lau. I thought you were too good for me these days," the man said in a rich Manchester accent.

"Nothing is too good for you, Clements, you know that. Let's walk, I have important business with this lovely lady here and I was interested to see if you might know anything about it," Loo replied.

Clements smiled widely. "Anything I can offer you," he said as they began walking. 

Loo lead them toward the back of the ware house where the workers thinned and the noise quieted. "My companion," he said as they went, indicating Anne once again, "is the lady Angelina Dalles-Burnett. It seems that two nights ago her sister's home was broken into an a number of valuable items were burgled from the premises. It is now very much in my interest to assist her in restoring her good sister's things," he explained.

"Would the good sister be alright after such an attack, should the woman not be with her for comfort?" Clements asked softly as if Anne would not hear.

"My sister was not harmed in any manner during the attack and as she is the wife of the Earl of Phantomhive I am sure she is used to such petty scares," Anne interjected. She saw Loo's shoulder bounce with amusement as Clements stiffened.

"You're bringing bad noblemen in here like it's nothing, Lau?" the man asked harshly.

"She's my friend," Loo said flippantly.

"What kind of friend?"

Loo gave her a curious backward glance that she could not properly discern and then turned his face forward once more. "A good one," he said. "I met her when she was sixteen and I had a partnership with her father."

"So you've been working with the family for a long time then."

"I am well acquainted enough with them to have received a wedding invitation when the Earl and his good wife set the date though I declined to attend as I was in America at the time."

"What are you asking then? What information do you need?"

"Do you know anyone who would have the case on Phantomhive manner, or anyone who would be up to the job? Otherwise rumors. Rumors are always good," Loo explained.

"The phantomhive manor is out in the country side two hours ride from here isn't it?" Clements asked. 

"Round about that amount of time give or take some," Loo replied.

"And the place is massive if I know right. It would take a team of people to break in."

"It was one man," Loo said. Anne instantly felt nervous thinking that one man could have possibly over come the dogs and the guards on the premises and then enter the home without altering any of the maids or manservants or the big black wolf hound her brother in law was so fond of.

"He'd have to be skilled," Clements said. "Skilled and fast, I've got a friend in White Chapel who's got information on all sorts of burglary and the like. He runs a shop on that sort of thing out the side door because he's already got a shop for the front and back. I'll warn you he takes unorthodox currency though, you're going to have to be very clever about it too."

"I'm never not clever," Loo said.

"I hope so otherwise he'll be more trouble than he's worth," Clements said before he proceeded to give them proper directions.

The sun was beginning to set when they got back outside and met the footman back at the carriage. He looked particularly tired and so did the driver sitting up on the seat and playing a game with a deck of ratty old cards. She felt infinitely sorry for them having to follow her around all the day on such a wild hunt. Their white pants looked dusty from the road and they probably felt the grime too she speculated. It would have been the proper thing to send them off.

"Do you think we should catch a taxi?" she asked Loo when the footman began to climb down.

"Money, Anne, not even you have it growing out of your ears," Loo said softly. She let that be the deciding factor. It was their job to do this after all.

White Chapel was ultimate not very far from them. The address to which they had been sent appeared to be a small apothecary and coroner's office. Coffins were stood up outside the door with their lids ajar to show their wooden interiors. The setting sun elongated the shadows and gave everything an eery feeling akin to that of a Dickens novel put out during the holiday season. 

A bell chimed softly when they opened the door and filed into the shop. It was even darker inside, and in the gloom Anne could not make out anything other than vague outlines and silhouettes. 

"Hello?" Loo called out. His voice fell like a metal object fell onto thick fabric without so much as a single reverberation giving the feeling that they were in a very tightly enclosed space. The claustrophobia began to creep in as he tried again, this time in his native tongue.

There was a small skittering noise toward the back of the store front and something stirred there in the dark. She gasped and Loo's hand wrapped around her elbow keeping her firmly behind him as if her were a shield. She noticed the girl step before even him and drop into a semi crouched position.

The sound of a match being struck broke the silence that they baited no more than seconds after. 

"A Chinaman," a gravely voice said as a thin man with long white hair that fell all about his shoulders and face was illuminated by the small flame. He was situated behind a counter and whether standing or sitting Anne could not discern. "And a Chinagirl," he added. He must have been an old man, Anne thought but he gave the impression of having strong, youthful countenance. "And what's that behind you?" he asked, using the long match in his long fingers to lite a small oil lamp that sat on the counter beside his elbows.

Anne did not like him.

"An English woman," Loo said.

"And is she your keeper?" the man asked.

Anne felt Loo stiffen with anger and knew she would have missed it had his hand not still been pressed firm to her jacket elbow. "My name is Liu," he said.

"Lau, I've heard of you," the old man said thoughtfully. "You're making a bit of a stir down by the docks selling English opium back to Englishmen."

"Everyone has to make a living somehow," Loo said.

"Yes, and I make a living off the dead," the old man said creakily. "I've also heard you're a nobleman with no last name and isn't that sad?"

"Maybe I have a last name that I have yet to share," Loo countered. "One must not assume things based on only having so much information. You may get wildly inaccurate readings that way."

"Regardless it's a bit funny for a fake Chinese nobleman to be on my doorstep at this hour in White Chapel with a lady who is clearly of real high birth and a prostitute, don't you think?" the old man asked.

Anne saw the girl tense angrily and reached out to touch her shoulder delicately. "He isn't worth your time, Ran-Mao," she said softly. The girl looked at the hand on her shoulder and then looked at Anne curiously before seeming to heed the advice.

"I'm here on business in need of information as I have been hired to account for some valuables the lady's sister lost. This girl is my body guard."

"A girl for a body guard?" the old man asked. Anne saw his crooked mouth curl into a smile that showed off perfectly straight unnaturally white teeth that should not have been in a person his age or social standing by the slightest. "That's funny."

"See if you think it's funny when I snap your neck," Ran-Mao said, pointing at the man. Her English was much more heavily accented than Loo's, and she spoke so quickly the words ran together a bit at their edges. 

He chuckled softly. "Spunky too. She would make a good whore."

Anne felt Loo's hand leave her arm suddenly and knew he was reaching for the girl before she had even registered that Ran-Mao was now gone, moving like water over the floor between them and sliding over the desk with ease. She was absolutely tiny stood up next to the man, but when her hands touched down on him she seemed to lift him effortlessly up over her body to slam him into the wall. Anne blinked and tried to comprehend what she'd just seen because she had been so unprepared to witness it that her mind had simply glossed over the details of what happened.

The old man howled with laughter, fingers twitching beneath his long black sleeves as she held him aloft somehow despite being no bigger than an adolescent boy. 

"I'll tell you!" he shrieked, giggling uncontrollably, "I'll tell you! I'll tell you no more it's too much!"

Ran-Mao looked very confused as she lowered the laughing man back onto his feet and stepped away from him.

"I'll tell you, I'll tell you," he continued to chant as he sat back down in his previous place "I'll tell you what you want to know," he declared finally when he was beginning to sober properly.

"Do you know anyone who would have the skill set to break into the Phantomhive manor alone while everyone was in without alerting anyone to the intrusion until the morning when it was noticed that valuable items were missing?" Loo asked.

"Do I know anyone?" he asked. "Oh yes, I do. You should go to that cult."

"What cult?"

"The cult that those dreadful noblemen head, you'll know them. They use magic to imbue their servants with powers that let them carry out any deed they wish," the old man said.

Loo swore in violent sounding Cantonese. "You expect me to believe that?" he asked.

"I thought you were from the mystical orient," the old man said.

"I'm not superstitious just because I come from somewhere you people are more superstitious about," Loo said.

"Are you certain of that, Lau?" the old man asked. "Are you certain you aren't even the slightest bit superstitious? Are you certain you've never encountered anything unexplainable."

"I direct you to yourself good sir, now answer me my question properly and stop telling me tales."

"Baron Kelvin" the old man said. "And I don't tell tales. I only speak truths and only when they're earned. Consider yourself lucky I find your little companion so amusing or you would not be able to sway my heart in any direction much less the direction you wish."

Ran-Mao bared her teeth at him.

"Thank you and goodbye then," Loo said, turning on his heal and showing them the way back out. It was then Anne realized that they had barely gotten past the threshold.

"I didn't think you'd be so closed minded?" Anne said when they were outside again. The sun was fully down now and it was dark enough that she had to look to spot their carriage waiting in the distance up the street.

"I'm not. I just know that usually when people are telling you it's magic it's a scam."

"So you do believe in magic?"

"Anne I'm a pirate," he said as if that explained everything. It explained nothing and she resented him for it. "Regardless," he continued. "It's getting late and we should be heading home. We can pick up this investigation in the morning."

She sighed but agreed as they climbed back into the carriage. Once she was seated she felt the bones of her corset dig into her ribs and lamented inwardly the necessity of wearing it. 

"Do you wish to stay over at my home until the morning?" she asked. "I could send round a person to fetch things for you."

"That would be convenient," Loo said softly, looking out the window at the street lamps as they were being lit by city workers.

When they arrived home, Anne shed her jacket with as much relief as a snake shed its skin, and immediately began undoing the buttons on her blouse. Her butler, an incompetent thing she'd only hired on recently when the sudden lack of manservants had begun to hit her household as well, tagged along beside her, his mousey brown hair bouncing behind him as he collected articles of clothing she shed.

"I'm still a man even if I'm from somewhere else," Loo said as she made a beeline for the stairs.

"I would even argue that makes you more of a man, Loo. You were a pirate after all and that has to take some reserve."

"Then why are you so blaze about being undressed in front of me?" he asked.

"To be honest it's because I know you see so many naked women so often. If anyone's desires have been curbed by excess it's you," she told him as she began to ascend the stair case. "I'm going to go change now," she said, starting to undo the bow she'd tied in her corset lacing and unwind the excess length from around her waist so that she could loosen it. "I'll be back down in a bit and we'll have supper before I have the staff show you to your rooms."

Loo bid her goodnight preemptively and she paused as she was undoing the clasps in the front of her corset to look back over her shoulder and glare at him. She saw his nostrils flare from across the room but didn't understand fully what that meant before she disregarded their joking entirely and continued on to her bedroom.

They were waiting for her in the sitting room when she got back dressed in much more comfortable evening home wear. Loo did not look directly at her as she directed them into the dining room. He took a seat on the opposite side of the table from her and Ran-Mao sat beside him. She got the feeling he was very much done with her for whatever reason and failed to engage him in proper conversation, preferring simply to watch as he argued with his little sister in fast syllables she wished she could decipher.

Many times throughout the meal, Ran-Mao motioned subtly towards Anne but it may have been imagination. Regardless she got the feeling the were gossiping about her and it made her unendingly self conscious.

After supper was finished, she had them shown to their rooms separately, worried what kind of things they could get up to if they knew each other's location in the middle of the night. When she had first met Ran-Mao she had been in Loo's bed after all. Anne highly doubted that he called her his sister with any modicum of seriousness.

She retired to her bedroom feeling odd and self conscious and regretful about most everything and fell into an uneven sleep.


	3. Chapter 3

The next morning greeted her early and painfully. Loo and his sister were waiting in the sun room when she came down stairs dressed for the day. They'd had breakfast drawn up there it seemed and when she arrived, Loo dished a few servings onto a plate for her. She took her seat daintily and he quickly averted his eyes from her.

Her offense was expertly hidden but Ran-Mao still sent him a threatening glance.

"I trust you both slept well," she said, inspecting the eggs he'd dished out for her over critically. He watched her do this with a cold detachment.

"Adequately," he said without looking back at her. Exasperation swept Ran-Mao's expressive face. Anne liked her in that moment with such a fierceness that she feared it make itself blatantly obvious. "And you?" he asked softly then, turning his face back to her, and pinching the table cloth between his fingers as if he could not bid himself still. 

She watched him with her full attention for a moment, trying to decipher what on earth was going on with him before responding with a mimicked, "Adequately." He looked away again as if he'd seen something that burned his eyes or perhaps it was his cheeks that were burning.

She wished in that moment that Ran-Mao had not been so easily coyed by cruel words dipped in colonialist paint so that she could have someone sensible to talk to, but she knew better than to push it. 

"Are you planning on taking us to see Baron Kelvin today?" she asked after another silence passed. 

"No," Loo said.

"No? Well why not?" she asked.

If someone tells you that the man you want for a crime is a nobleman you go around to all his acquaintances and you make damn well certain they're the right man or you'll potentially face treason for the accusation," he explained.

"Well perhaps if you're of common birth, but I'm no-"

"Isn't it still better to cover our crinolines, Anne? We don't want everyone knowing we're sloppy and full of ourselves."

"Well it can't hurt people to know the truth about you," she said. The corner of his lip turned up sharply and she watched him struggle to pull it back down. "Forget about it, okay?" she said then, placing both her elbows on the table and leaning over her arms. "What should we do first, Captain Loo?"

He attempted to hide another smile and failed once again. "Well you're smart, Anne," he said. "What do we do when we can't get our hands on an evil gentleman yet?"

"Oh I'm not good at crime, I'm a doctor who's never broken the law in her life."

Loo fixed her with a hard, questioning look and she gave him her own reluctant smile. 

"Good thing I live in the underworld and so there by know where to find a corrupt man's less well known accomplices," he explained with a smile that made him seem dangerous and carefree all at once. She took a bite of ham and returned the expression, knowing full well that whatever strange sort of disagreement they'd been having it was over now and he'd started to see sense again.

"Then we have a plan of action it seems," she said. "Go back to the London underground and resume doing exactly what we were doing yesterday."

"Yes, and may I ask how this is impacting your practice?"

"Not at all. I own the practice and so employ a number of other doctors who fill in for me when I am out. How else is a lady supposed to enjoy the seasonal times otherwise?" 

Loo gave her a single chuckle and leaned back in his chair again, looking at Ran-Mao. "I know a man who is affiliated with the bad apples of Victoria's bunch and I think he may have some further insight into the situation. When we finish here, we'll go to him."

"Excellent," Anne said, taking another bite. Loo watched her eat with a detached amusement for a moment before turning back to Ran-Mao and striking up a soft conversation once more, adjusting the collar of his purple dress. She ignored him after that in favor of finishing her meal and catching up with them.

The address that Loo gave the driver this time took them to a small tenement building near Billingsgate between the Tower and the old city ruins. He claimed the man was inside, a back alley doctor who took care of gang members affiliated with the court. Anne instantly felt an unease creep into her at the idea of associating with a fake medical professional but she didn't say anything about it, afraid Loo would tease her proclivities. He would not understand that she'd taken an oath.

He lead them through the building to the back where an old withered door was marked with a heavy brass 4. He knocked briskly and then hid his hands in his sleeves once more. There was no sound behind the door for what seemed a very long time but Loo waited patiently until she heard the faint sound of pitter-pattering footsteps on the other side.

The man who opened the door was a nervous one who's nails had been bitten down to the quick and whose thinning hair had been brushed over the bare crown of his scalp in an attempt to hide that he was balding preemptively. He did not look happy to see them as his face fell from worry to obvious horror when he lay his eyes on the silk clothing of his caller.

"I wasn't expecting you, Lau," he said in a middle class accent that did not befit his place of residence nor his worn clothing. "I figured you were dead or out on the docks trying to be dead. Either way I shan't have you here," he added. He made an attempt to close the door but Loo leaned against it with his shoulder, giving the man a full view of the two women standing behind him.

"Actually I have someone I would like you to meet," he said calmly, steadily increasing the amount of weight he put on the door. The man was shivering now and trying very hard to close them out but Loo had quite a bit of size and muscle on him. "This is Angelina Dalles-Burnett, the lovely widow of the late Baron Burnett. Anne, this little rat is Donald Vernon. He has two first names and no spine."

"How do you do?" Anne introduced herself. She did not bother to curtsey as Donald was not paying her much mind at all.

"You can't be here, you'll have to go," he insisted, attempting to push Loo away from the door entirely with one hand and failing in a miserable sort of way.

"Isn't it rude not to at least invite guests in for tea, Donald?" Loo asked , pressing the side of his foot along the bottom edge of the door. 

"I don't care!" Donald said loudly.

"You'll make a scene," Loo argued.

"Have them call the police then!"

Loo's hand came out of his sleeve in a low, horizontal arch and impacted with the door with a solid thud, bouncing it into Donald's forehead and knocking the man back so that he could enter without further obstruction. Anne followed Ran-Mao over the threshold with what was probably a lot less casualty than her companions.

"I'm not asking much," Loo declared as Donald gave up and shut the door nicely behind him.

"Tea?" he asked, gesturing to a kitchenette dining room combination.

"That would be lovely," Loo said. Donald wrestled a cast iron tea kettle out of one of the cupboards and began to fill it from a large jug on the counter. "I need to know who works for the Baron Kelvin."

Donald turned around to face them, placing his hands on the counter for support. "And what does this have to do with me?" he asked.

Anne watched Loo's face dissolve into a slow smile that spoke of cruel thoughts. "You work with men who work with noblemen," Loo observed.

"I'm aware."

"And so you work with men who work with my nobleman so tell me who you know who knows him and I'll leave you be."

Donald glared at the kettle for a moment. "Thought you were staying for tea," he said.

Loo sat down at the table in a very pointed manner. "I'm looking for thieves in particular. Burglars. The type that breaks into nice houses and takes things."

"I know a thief living not to far from here who has been said to be associated with Kelvin," Donald said. "He's just across the river."

Donald sent them to Southwark past warehouses that were probably owned by men similar to Loo and into the slums. They found themselves in front of an old inn that looked like it was more of a bar for the locals than a tourist attraction of any kind. At the bar, they asked for Himey as they had been directed to do and were shown to a room.

A short woman with a beak nose answered the door. She had a thick cockney accent that made her sound drunk and slurred when she opened up her mouth and asked them harshly what they wanted.

"I was told you worked for the Baron Kelvin," Loo said.

"'Oo want's to know?"

"My name is Lau," he told her, slipping his hand out of his sleeve and pressing it to his chest with a very slight bow. Likely the slightest bow Anne had ever seen. 

"Don't know you."

"I wouldn't imagine," he said. "I am a trader from China and I have some business with the Baron," he told her.

"Go after 'im then," she said. 

"I'm afraid its more complex than that, could you let us have a seat?" he asked.

The woman looked hesitant when she let them through but she did it anyway. Why, Anne would never know really but Loo was charming in a way that she still had yet to fully understand and she had seen him talk his way into and out of many situations that seemed unlikely.

He thanked them as they entered and the woman looked them over each individually, eyes lingering particularly long on the red taffeta of Anne's dress. It looked like a room meant for little more than sleeping in and Anne wondered if this woman lived and worked here regularly. She remembered for a moment when she had left to put herself through school and her parents had cut off her funding leaving her to fall back on Loo's hospitality and cheap hotels. It was the only time she'd ever understood what it might be like to be poor.

"Are you Himey?" Loo asked her as she pointed to several stiff backed chairs for them to sit in. 

"S'mah 'usband," she said. There was a mop leaning against the wall in a bucket and a portion of the floor was wet. The woman must have been mopping before their intrusion.

"Is he here at the moment?"

"Out. 'E's got business today. Didn't tell me where 'e was goin'."

"Would it be alright for us to wait here until he gets back?" Loo asked.

She hesitated. "I was jus' doin' a bit of 'ouse work," she said and trailed off wringing her hands. "Yes I 'magine you can stay," she said finally after chewing on air for a time. "Would you like tea?"

They had just had tea with Donald but Loo accepted the offer anyway and the woman marched out an old chipped tea set from inside a trunk. It looked slightly dirty but it had been of reasonable quality at one point. While their hostess wasn't looking, Anne turned her cup over to read the manufacture stamp on the bottom. It was an American make which somewhat baffled her for a moment as she couldn't imagine why Americans would make tea pots in the first place let alone export them to England.

The woman used Bigelow tea bags and Anne watched the cheap preservatives that had melted off the netting of them float around the top of her cup when it had been filled for her. She drank anyway because she understood that not everyone would always be able to offer the very best and they'd sprung in on the woman without warning leaving her woefully unprepared. In her hands, her tiny American cup felt cherished beyond measure and she took note to be gentle with what was likely a beloved possession.

There was no apology for the lack of service but no one else mentioned it either. Instead the class gap hung in the air as a pungent reminder of how unfair life was.

"'Imey's not usually 'ome 'till late," she told them. "'E stays out all day sayin' 'e works but I don't see any money." There was a long silence and her fingers tapped a nervous tune on the china in her hands. "Are you come to get your debt from 'im?" she asked as an addendum. Her voice shook with certain fright.

"I'm no repossessions agent if that's what you think," Loo assured her. 

"Please, sir," she said. "I know 'e ain't good but if you take 'im away I won't 'ave anythin' left, I can't make any money on my own I'm just an old woman. I can't even be placed from workhouses as I've no idea how to cook or clean proper enough for a fancy 'ouse'old such as that lady's and if I 'aven't even got my 'usband I'll surely not even be able to afford this room."

"It sounds like you can barely afford this room with him," Anne said. "I assure you Himey owes us no money and we mean him no harm, but surely it can't be worth staying with the man if he doesn't even bring home money to feed you at the end of the day."

The woman blinked at her owlishly, the water in her eyes slowly draining back out to the places human bodies hide sadness. "What other option do I 'ave?" she asked.

Anne didn't know what to tell her.

"Does Himey have any friends that he works with on a regular basis?" Loo asked. 

"Well there's Darrel and 'arry but they don't come 'round much since a few weeks ago. I remember 'imey said they was all working' together on sommat and they all started goin' other places. I barely saw anyone at all and then 'imey came back but no Darrel and 'arry. I thought to myself they must 'ave got in trouble with the Yard an' I didn't ask much but now you're asking it does seem strange. Do you think they was working for that Baron like you said?"

"I've been lead to believe so," Loo informed her. "I promise you that our problem is not with the Baron's associates so much as the Baron himself. If your husband is cooperative and tells me all I need to know I will not harm him."

"And if he's not?" the woman asked. 

Loo met her gaze and held it firmly so that she could look into his dark eyes and see in them gauge reflections of things they had witnessed throughout his life. Understanding alit in her and Anne saw fear grow in her stomach like veracious weeds taking over a garden.

"You can't kill 'im," she said.

"I won't."

"You can't cripple 'im either, you promise me."

"I won't."

"Where'll you cut then?" 

"Why would you ask that?" he inquired. Her eyes darted to a door set into the wall farthest from the room's entrance. Loo turned, following her gaze and Anne watched the woman's eyes widen in fear. Ran-Mao was out of her seat in an instant, her hand catching the woman's wrists so that she could make no move, sending her tea cup tumbling into the air and onto the ground.

The sound of it shattering deafened Anne and reverberated through the room with much more force than it should have. Her ears rang and she looked wildly around attempting to comprehend what had just happened. The door the woman had looked at was now open and another woman was standing there holding a pistol in her hand, smoke wafting up from its barrel.

It was aimed at Loo, but her eyes were on Ran-Mao who had wound her way back around the first woman and pressed a knife to her neck. "You shoot I kill!" the girl warned. She had to pull the woman back and stand on her tip toes to see over her shoulder but it did not manage to make her any less managing as her nostrils flared wildly.

"Step away from her and I put down the gun," the second woman instructed.

"Put the gun down first," Ran-Mao insisted. Loo held up a hand telling her to wait.

"Are you Himey?" he asked the second woman.

"Not if you're looking for me," she said. The woman in Ran-Mao's hold scrambled at the strong arms around her neck and snarled ineffectually.

"My name is Lau and I was interested if you knew anything about the Baron Kelvin stealing goods from Phantomhive manor," he said. The woman took her eyes off of Ran-Mao and transferred her full attention to him.

Himey as a man as Donald knew him, but underneath his clothing Himey was a woman. She was reluctant to give them information once she was placated, but Loo assured her she would be an entirely confidential informant on someone who was in all honesty of very questionable morals. 

"And what happens when you go and get your revenge?" she asked.

"I'm not after revenge," Loo said. "We're simply in business to retrieve what was stolen. If we operate correctly the Baron won't even know he's been robbed back."

Himey gave him an appraising look. "I'll give you a man who knows the Baron's lands but only if you swear to me in blood that this won't come back to me again," she said.

Loo smiled, his teeth showing wickedly as he held a hand out to her. "I'm glad your lady friend was lying about your disposition, Himey," he said. "I would not swear in blood for some angry man with no sense to keep his wife fed but a woman who is twisting the way things work to her advantage has my full respect."

Anne saw the hints of a smile play at Himey's lips.

"You're being lied to," the woman said.

The bottom of Anne's stomach dropped out. Loo was looking at her, eyes questioning. 

"The man you want," Himey continued as if she'd never said anything in the first place, "Lives in Sussex. Alborne. He won't be available for three days time but when the time comes, I would recommend staying at a hotel as you conduct you dealings with him. And try," she added, "To keep yourselves under wraps. However hard that might be considering you're two China people and a ginger."

Loo was still looking at Anne when he told Himey that would be quite alright and thank you for her time. 

"What does she mean I'm being lied to?" Loo asked when they got home. Kensington was perfectly manicured around them but Loo did not blend in with the subtleties of his surroundings. She had been told as a young girl, before she'd met him that people from China were small and demure. Loo on the other hand was brushing six foot and had a temper beneath his childish, playful attitude. 

"I may be a woman but that doesn't mean I can read another woman's mind," Anne said, turning her back on him and marching inside. It was afternoon and she was thinking of calling the staff to draw them up a late dinner but Loo did not seem to have any interest in food. 

He cornered her against the door as she was about to open it, pressed his large palms into the wood over her head and leaned in close so that she could smell the nuances of the opium den he ran clinging to the fibers of his silk dress. "What did she mean, Anne?" he asked. She swallowed around a tightness in her throat and flattened herself against the wainscoting on the door. 

"Talk inside," she said, spying the footman over Loo's shoulder waffling between weather he should help his employer or stay as far away from the ex-pirate as he could. Anne sympathized. 

Loo at least allowed her to move the budding argument inside away from the prying eyes of potential on lookers as the nobility and the bourgeoisie became park goers and long walkers together. When the door was shut though he was every bit a flutter. 

"You shouldn't be keeping things from me," he claimed. 

She did not look at him. "I know what I'm doing, Loo. What I don't tell you is what you don't need to know." She heard his glare in the shift of his motion. "You can stay here until it's time for us to go and find the man with he blueprints."

"I will," he said. He did not push past that.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Saw this morning that this got a comment, realized I was almost done with this chapter anyway and finished it. Warning, I may not be able to fit it all into 5 chapters as hoped. It may end up being six or seven. Doubt any longer than that.

Loo gathered them in a sitting room, threw about pillows and cushions and withdrew small paper triangles from a clutch bag he'd kept hidden in the lining of his sleeves. Anne watched calmly as he poured powder into the brass bowl of an elegant pipe and handed it to Ran-Mao. 

Cannabis was packed into a second pipe which he handed to Anne. Then, with all the calm and grace of someone who commonly gives drugs to gentry, he made a circular motion with his finger, indicating they share with one another and him.

"Perhaps we should discuss further action before we begin recreation," Anne suggested softly.

Lau fixed her with a soft glare. "No," he said. "No more talking about that. I'm sick of it."

She bit the inside of her lip. There was a knowledge within her that she had transgressed and done so wrongly but she had no idea how to fix it. This was nothing like tending to a patient, a field in which everything had been mapped out for her before in medical text books and the like. No, instead Loo was a wash of uncharted territory the way any human being was. He was nuance and complexity based in his upbringing and his socialization and so many other things she had not been there for and could not possibly understand.

She ached to know but at the same time knew that she never would. Ran-Mao would have ever more insight into the man's mind than Anne could even hope to possess. The girl touched her arm softly as a show of support. They at least had the common ground of both being women and came together on that. With Loo the only real ties she had were her dead father and her myopic brother in law.

She smoked. He packed more into their pipes and she kept smoking until she was light and dizzy and could not well feel her body at all. It was not her first time imbibing. When she'd been putting herself through medical school she had spent a lot of time in Loo's clutches and learned much of what intoxication could do for one's stresses.

She grew tired of her restricting clothing after a time and loosened it, something Ran-Mao found funny. The girl said something in her first language that Anne had no hope of understanding and toed her shoe off her foot. She looked then to Loo, fixed him with a wide smile and toed off her other shoe. He watched her with mild interest. 

It was like it was a game they normally played, something Loo was used to. She slipped the little bangles off her ankles gently and began to roll down her stockings. Anne felt a deep set unease creep into her at the growing sensual tone to the situation. She did not want to be some third wheel spectator to their sex life. 

Ran-Mao's legs were slender and girlish when they were uncovered. Their skin looked smooth and fair like a baby's cheeks. Anne made a move to leave but the girl caught her elbow and sat her back down. She was being invited openly to watch.

The girl knelt on the couch cushions beside her and pulled the sleeves of her jacket down off her arms so they were left bare up to the shoulder where the hem of her dress began. Anne looked at Loo and found him watching her instead of the spectacle. She was nervous but he did not seem insistent so much as intrigued. Like he was waiting to see how she would respond.

She realized then that she had unwittingly started this and that Ran-Mao was likely in some way challenging her. She felt challenged that was for certain. Ran-Mao smiled at her daringly as she undid the frogs that fastened her cheongsam. Anne popped another one of the buttons on the front of her dress.

She remembered a moment how she had undressed the minute the door was closed the day before and the way that Loo had watched her. He was watching her now. The new situation she found her self in she felt offered perhaps a bit of insight into his previous fit as well. It was possible she had aroused him unwittingly.

His nostrils flared when she met his eyes. It was impossible from the distance she sat in relation to him to tell his pupils from the dark color of his irises and even if she had been close enough their breadth would have been little indicator to his interest due to the intoxicants they had imbibed so judiciously. Slowly, he leaned forward, reached out over the space between the couch and his chair, and helped her by undoing the next button for her.

She gasped and stared at his hand. His fingers twitched before wrapping around the black bone edge of the last button. Anticipation for some strange and unfathomable thing crept up around her calves and into the backs of her knees. He shook it free and she jumped a bit as the fabric fell open to reveal the blouse she wore underneath. He made a sound deep in his throat that was half a moan and half a whine. It set her on fire.

"He likes you," Ran-Mao said, startling Anne so that she whipped her head around. "And you like him too right?" The girl pressed close, her breasts pushing against Anne's back as her hand snaked down to pull the dress open further. 

"I'm not sure," Anne said. She felt Ran-Mao smirk.

"Liar," she said softly and she was right. Loo was looking at her and the expression on his face was not something she had not encountered before. In fact, she remembered seeing it there when they'd been young and he'd struggled to pronounce her name. The context made sudden sense of his personal vendetta against Vincent.

Anne licked her lips, swallowed and bared her throat to him. She had been celibate since the accident. She hadn't even thought of having sex again let alone sought it out. Before it she had enjoyed men though and more men than just her husband as he had not been the first. Of course she'd thought he would be the last.

How could she not have seen Loo coming though? She should have known from the first time they met by the shaking in his hands and the way he asked her father about her. She should have known from the way he used to bring her presents, the way he always made horrible fun of her suitors. 

She reached up and began undoing her blouse. Ran-Mao helped her slide it off her shoulders so that she was sitting in her skirt and her slip, the top of her corset showing through the lace. 

She hesitated. They hesitated. Ran-Mao's hands were warm on her arms and it was stark in contrast to the cool air of the room. She squeezed her knees together. In a motion that was clearly deliberate, Loo slid from his chair and onto his knees before her. There were servants all about the house, they were far from alone. He unclasped her skirt.

His eyes on her eyes, asking for consent for a moment, waiting for her nod before he removed the garment. He took her crinoline with it in a move that had to have been practiced. She wondered how many English women he'd been with. His hands were on her thighs now, warm and boring through the fabric of her slip. She quivered. Ran-Mao's breath hitched against her ear.

Loo had been tiny when she first met him. His wrists had been as thin as the glass in her father's spectacles and she would have guessed that his ribs were prominent beneath his clothes but as some point that had changed. She understood this and as she watched him strip out of his cheongsam she knew she had seen him bare chested before but the realization of just how much had changed since they were both sixteen hadn't hit her until that moment. 

His tattoos robbed him of his nudity, making him out like a canvas covered in writhing shapes and motifs, covering and decorating his scars. She shivered when his hands found her thighs again. His palms cupped her knees and gently pushed them apart so that he was face to face with her. Again, he made that sound deep in his throat and again it made her quiver.

He brought his mouth to her so that his lips were almost against hers. "I'm still angry," he said. Anne moaned. She had half a mind to stop him, reach down between her legs and press her hand against his forehead so he couldn't complete the task at hand.

She failed to though. Not through any great misfiring in her neurons so much as indecision and arousal. His tongue was warm and wet. Her hips came up off the couch and slid forward to push against it. 

"See?" Ran-Mao cooed, pulling Anne's slip over her head. Her hands were on corset strings and fastenings, loosening and unbinding. Loo hummed when the garment was pulled open. The girl's fingers were delicate on Anne's breasts but their calluses gave them a rough hewn edge.

A knock came suddenly on one of the doors, startling Anne so that she jumped with a muffled shout. She attempted to gather up her clothing very quickly as she heard the door handle begin to turn. "Don't come in here!" Loo warned and the person at the door hesitated.

"Mistress?" she heard asked very tentatively from the other side. "Is everything alright?"

"Fine," Anne said, voice too high. "Fine thank you." She was frantically putting her clothing back on, not bothering to lace or button so much as hold it all closed so she would be covered. Both Loo and Ran-Mao watched the door. She felt horribly embarrassed and self conscious, slightly worried she'd be asked to continue but neither of them made any further moves to touch her personage.

They waited in silence a while until she cleared her throat, still feeling very much intoxicated, and said, "Should we get off to our beds then?"

Loo nodded and sent the door a wry sort of smile.

"We'll talk in the morning," he said. Anne looked to Ran-Mao behind her trying to see if she could gain any insight into the man through the lines of the girl's face. 

He had said he was still angry. She dreaded what that meant. Loo was a man, and one who had come into power through struggle. His anger was a viral and potent thing. This was not to say that she believed him fickle however as Loo often seemed nothing but steadfast when he made decisions. It was getting him to make them that was the hard part not getting him to stick by them. Having known him for so long she doubted that he would react to her with any kind of real malcontent but the idea of being removed from his life due to her failings in communication was just as much a fright to her as any physical harm he potentially impose.

"Stop," she said, when he made a move to gather up his own clothing. "We'll talk now," she said. "Sleep can wait. This is important."

He stopped still and watched her.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I should have been honest with you."

He blinked in an open and baffled way as if he had never expected to hear a sincere apology out of her and she supposed in that instance that he hadn't but then too she had never been asked to apologize before now because he was a very forgiving man. 

"You should have," he agreed after a long moment of silence. "But I'm also sure you have your reasons and it's likely a bit ridiculous for me to expect to be included in family affairs."

"You aren't so foreign as to completely be removed from my family," she began softly.

"Goodnight," he said.

She watched him leave quietly and turned again to the girl. "Have I bolluxed this further then?" she asked. Ran-Mao gave her a shrug.

"People leave a lot," she said. It struck Anne as a very sad thing to say but the girl shrugged again. "I've heard about you as long as we've been in England. I don't think you want to leave, but like you say, Liu's not as smart as I am."

"It's the outside perspective," Anne said. "People who aren't emotionally involved usually have a more realistic view of things right? Isn't that why we're always pretending we don't find a thing anything other than funny."

"When you don't feel things you're smarter is bullshit. Just make sure you feel things slow so you don't react on impulse. Wait until you have all the information before you make a decision," Ran-Mao said.

"You know your English really is very good, but it's not like you need to talk most of the time to be understood," Anne replied. The girl blushed, lips curling in on each other as she decompartmentalized the compliment.

She smiled shyly after a moment. "Most people aren't even worth talking for," she said, quietly. 

"And it's not like most men listen anyway," Anne said, knowing that Ran-Mao likely suffered that torment in a much greater way due to her race and commodification.

There was a small silence and Anne got up then, saying goodnight calmly before excusing herself. She was still aroused when she lay down in bed but she did nothing for it other than let her fingers shake until the intoxicants bore her off to interesting sleep. She dreamt Loo came to her room that night but he didn't.

Loo greeted her with a devilish smile when they gathered around the breakfast table, something to which she had no actual response.

"Do we have any plans for today?" he asked, twirling a fork between his thumb and fore finger.

"Nothing really," Anne told him "I've taken the week off so I don't have any obligations and as it's not exactly the social season there aren't any parties I need to be at. Now there's still ice lining the sides of the Thames but I think someone said something about some sort of market being held. We could go see what's selling."

Loo rolled his eyes in a grandiose sort of way. "I hate shopping," he said.

Anne sat her chin in her hand and listened patiently as he embarked on a long rant about the stresses of being forced to engage in prolonged physical activity while he tried to maintain a relative level of intoxication for the millionth time since she'd met him. Strangely, in that moment she felt a level of contentness having him easily in her home doing the things he did as casually as he always did them. A bit of the ache of emptiness ebbed then and she felt less trapped by the walls.

"So you want to spend the day drunk on life?" she asked.

"Anne, please. I spend all my time drunk on life. I cannot recall the last time we spoke and I was sober," he declared.

"Really?"

"No because I'm high right now. I can only remember things that happened while I was high."

"That's not actually how it works," Anne began but Loo smiled at her benignly, put up a hand to stop her and said, "No, Anne it really is I don't expect you to understand." His poker face would have been perfect too if the dimple in his right cheek hadn't made a sudden appearance at the end of the sentence. 

"Okay," she said around a suppressed laugh. "We could go find some interesting spectacle to watch," she said.

"Like a play or something?" he asked. "No. Perhaps we should go visit your sister."

The shock on Anne's face made it look like her neck had regretted her chin and tried to suck it back up. "Why on earth should we do that?" she asked.

"Well, I thought since they are her things-"

"She's much too distraught at the moment."

"I thought you said she was fine."

"Yes, to get you to stop asking about it." She paused, taking a deep breath. "I'm doing this because Vincent asked me to and I'm doing it in the way I'm doing it because he asked me to," she admitted.

The look on his face was calculating and she may have seen a bit of fear flicker in the corners of his eyes but it also could have been her imagination. Suddenly, she wanted to keep Loo as far from Vincent as possible, removing him from not only the phantomhive taint but also her long torn and tattered affection which still held on despite her best efforts. There was a sudden and gripping terror that the reminder of her tie to another man would put more distance between them.

Softly, he nodded. "Vincent is always getting himself into half lit situations," he said with a heavy air in his voice as if he'd been possessed by the ghost of a sigh. Anne hooked her ankles around each other stiffly. "In that case," he said, chaining the subject entirely. "We've recently been to China and I was wondering if perhaps you'd like to look through some of the materials we brought back."

"What sort of materials?" she asked.

"Any that could potentially help your practice, or not, depending on what you like."

"You're trying to unload all your old garbage on me aren't you?" she asked jokingly, watching as his eyes creased around the corners with a smirk. 

"We'll see when we get there, won't we?"

Loo didn't have a permanent home in England. He professed to spending most of his stays in friend's guest bedrooms. He then continued onward to say that he didn't mind guest bedrooms much as most of his friends these days were exceedingly rich. Anne laughed softly as he lead her into an opium den and down a long flight of stairs. 

Like most of the establishments Loo owned, it capitalized upon the English ideology glorifying the strangeness of the orient, decorated in distinctly ethnic things with occasional european comforts thrown in. Truly if there was anything the man did well it was benefit from the ignorance of others. 

He led her down a long hallway dotted with doors and archways along either side which opened into shallow personal rooms. When they stopped before a door just barely shy of the hallway's abrupt end, he produced a key from his sleeve and unlocked it. Like the other rooms, the one inside was not large. In fact it was quite small, a rectangular room that would be just big enough for a bed that fit two people and some walking space, matching exactly in perimeters with the ones that had come before it but filled instead with piles upon piles of interesting things that could not be properly made out without added lighting. 

He took his time to add flourish to lighting the lamp within, bringing the collection into focus. The bulk of it was raw material. Bolts of silk lay stacked up in a corner and chunks of wood behind them, but there was the occasional piece of furniture and pottery. 

"Why aren't you selling these things like the rest of what you import?" she asked.

"Imperfections and cancelled orders," he told her, playing with the tassel on the end of a sword that was almost as tall as he was. 

"Do you have any red silk?" she asked, eying the bolts of fabric. Some red silk would be a pretty dress to match with her colors and make people fawn over her with was always a plus. 

He did have red silk. It was why he'd brought her in the first place because it had been her shade of red and he couldn't think of anyone else to give it to. The bolt he pulled out of the chaos was as thick as an elephant's leg and too heavy for her to lift. She couldn't have guessed the amount of money it would be worth. Likely even she had never seen that much currency at once before. 

"Do you know how many dresses?" she asked. He smirked at the bolt.

"No clue."

"I'm going to have so many new dresses, and everyone will be jealous!" she told him happily. "How much?"

"How much?"

"How much?"

"You don't need to-"

"It's not like either of us is in the business of doing favors, Loo."

She had a point and for a second she saw him stumble as it impacted perfectly. "I'll just owe you a favor," she concluded because that would be fair and being in debt to him was better than being in debt to just about anyone else. She saw Ran-Mao give Loo a look as they had the fabric hauled out up the stairs and back to street level but she didn't understand its significance.

She spent the day from there on in deep discussion with the girl about what sort of dresses she should make. Ran-Mao insisted something form fitting, but Anne was more in the mind of glorious court dresses set to match the queen's standard well enough to make other women blush in their ill-fitting attire. Loo laughed at them silently, busying himself with paperwork he'd picked up before they left. 

The house felt comfortable.


End file.
